Rascal governor “Happy” Hopper (Guy Kibbee) is forced to choose a replacement for the recently deceased senator from his unnamed home state. The powerful Jim Taylor (Edward Arnold) who controls state politics orders him to appoint a stooge who will push through a crooked dam appropriation. Popular committees want the governor to appoint a reform candidate to the Senate.

But Happy’s children demand that the post be awarded to the head of the Boy Rangers, Jefferson Smith, as honest and patriotic an American hero as you can find. When Happy’s coin toss fails to land heads or tails, he selects to the U.S. Senate Smith, played by James Stewart, in the star making role of his career.

The villainous Taylor is outraged, while the sophisticated Senator Paine (Claude Rains) assures him that due to Smith’s naivete, he will not be a threat to their interests. But Paine discovers that Smith is the son of his one-time friend, a newspaper editor who was murdered when he took on a lost cause against a mining corporation. To keep Smith busy, Paine suggests he propose a bill.

Staying up all night with his jaded secretary Saunders (Jean Arthur), a smart blonde who knows every angle in Washington, Smith introduces a bill that would purchase a piece of land in his home state for a boys’ camp, unaware that the same parcel of land is part of the dam scheme Paine is being counted on to push through with no questions asked.

Saunders is unwilling to watch Smith destroyed, so she quits. Paine produces evidence he claims proves that Smith is crooked. Unable to face his mentor, Smith packs his bags, but Saunders, who has come to believe in him, returns to his side. With her help, Smith launches into a record breaking filibuster to keep him on the Senate floor long enough for the people back home to learn the truth about the Taylor political machine and its corruption of American democracy.

Directed by Frank Capra, with a screenplay Sidney Buchman adapted from Lewis Foster’s novel The Gentleman From Montana, Mr. Smith Goes To Washington was recently voted #29 on the American Film Institute’s list of top 100 movies of the last 100 years. The term “Capraesque” was also coined here, defining a movie filled with uplifting or sentimental idealism.

This film entertained, charmed and gosh darn it, I’ll say it, inspired me from the start. It’s the quickest 130 minutes I’ve ever spent with a movie; I was actually disappointed to learn that a much needed epilogue was cut by Capra after a test audience responded thumbs down to it.

Mr. Smith Goes To Washington has the same quality that made Rocky a great underdog tale: a dark undercurrent. Rocky Balboa was no Disney character, he was a hired thug who was bitter as hell for never being given a shot in his prime. Here it’s Capra, who despite his popular fables, never turned a blind eye to suffering, whether it was economic depression in It Happened One Night or personal depression in It’s A Wonderful Life.

Watching the film, it comes through loud and clear how disgusted Capra was with the status quo in Washington. How Capra managed to channel his resentment into a romantic comedy/fable/civics lesson that can stand up in any classroom 70 years after it was made is remarkable.

If ever there was a film that promoted truth, justice and the American way in a family friendly format, I would think this would be it, but on its release, Mr. Smith Goes To Washington was condemned both right and left. It was accused of being anti-American for suggesting there was graft going on in Washington, and banned in Nazi Germany and other fascist states, presumably due to its title character challenging the government.

Capra was even refused permission by the Parks Service to shoot in its monuments. For the classic scenes where James Stewart wanders in amazement through the Lincoln Memorial, Capra allegedly packed his camera into a van and had Stewart jump out to do his scene. Then they’d take off before the cops showed.

The film is wonderfully cast, with Stewart giving probably the most iconic performance of his career, Claude Rains terrific as his morally complex mentor, and Harry Carey almost stealing the movie as the supposedly impartial President of the Senate. Carey only has about 20 lines, most of them expository, but his encouraging nods and smiles just when Smith seems ready to throw in the towel with his filibuster are brilliant.

But in a cast of tremendous character actors and future stars, it was Jean Arthur who impressed me the most here. Receiving top billing – in an era when actresses routinely were awarded it over their male co-stars – she is the best thing in the movie. With lines like, “I wasn’t given a brain just to tell a boy ranger what time it is” Arthur punches her performance with a wit and moxie that is largely unseen by women in modern films.

Saunders (who is genuinely elated when Smith’s mother calls her “Clarissa”) bases her attraction to Smith on mutual respect and admiration, but their feelings for each other are evident in the way Arthur looks at Stewart or rolls her dialogue. This is just beautiful stuff.

Nominated for ten Academy Awards, Mr. Smith Goes To Washington is one of the best of the best of Hollywood’s Golden Age and highly recommended. Sidenote: as a civics nerd, I also found it interesting that there are only 96 senators in the film. Alaska and Hawaii did not join the United States until 1959.